Gold can turn to sand
by LobbyLane
Summary: Dealing with your own past is never easy... Leo knows... But what he doesn't know is what happened before he knocked on that office door... Max/Leo fluff The Producers (c) Mel Brooks


**A/N: I wantd to explain a bit of the pasts of Leo and Max for ages... Maybe, I'll do Leo next. Hope you like it ;)**

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"Max?"

Brooding over some papers the whole day, the older man merely grunted a reply, but didn't stop the almost annoying sound of the scratching pen on the paper. He didn't even look up.

It had gotten late and Leo didn't bother switch on the lights. The little table lamp shed enough light on the office-room anyway. And he enjoyed watching Max, dipped half in shadows.

Leo sat in a quiet corner in the old armchair and hadn't said a word for a long time. His eyes had been wandering around the room, watching everything in there; everything that was oh so familiar by now, yet left him in awe every time anew. He loved being here. And, even though he lived here for quite a while now, the memories of setting foot for the first time came upon him every once in a while. How excited he had been... He was used to it now, but still loved to look at all the little gimmicks and widgets, posters and playbills everywhere.

"Max?" he asked once more.

"Hm?" He still didn't look up.

Leo sighed. Usually it was the other way round. He would work until he almost fell asleep while Max was trying to convince him to call it a day. This was odd. At least to him.

Looking away, he thought about letting it rest for a second, but still he felt uncomfortable about the silence somehow.

"Max?...Why do you live here?" he whispered more to himself while looking around again.

"You live here too...what kind of question is this?" he heard Max's peeved voice and turned his head to look at him again. He was still writing rabidly, not bothering to even lift his head.

Leo blushed a little. He didn't mean him to hear. Yet, he knew Max wouldn't notice.

"I...well, I just wondered, if...," Leo stuttered. "...If you ever lived somewhere else... I somehow connect you with this place only..." How stupid was that? Leo almost wished Max hadn't heard it. Sometimes he spoke out loud whatever he thought... A more or less embarrassing habit.

"Of course," Max answered and made Leo look up again. "I've had a life before as well... And also I used to live in different places... Just like everybody else."

Leo silently nodded and looked away again. He shouldn't have asked. But his thoughts were still flying... A life before that... He thought about his own, but tried to shake off that spark of his past that seemed to inflame again the longer he clung to it. No need to spend any thoughts on that time.

But about Max's past he knew as good as nothing... He'd never told him anything. Well, not really. Once or twice a few scenes of his past would come across his lips, but usually he would just change the topic whenever Leo asked a little more.

"Must have been quite different," he murmured.

"What are you talking about?" Max still didn't stop that pen from scratching.

"I mean before you became a producer... Life must have been different...," Leo continued. He noticed his voice getting quieter with every word. What was he so afraid of?

"Leo?"

Leo lifted his head to find Max looking at him from his desk. The younger man swallowed his own words, while Max let go of that darn pen.

"Why are you asking all this?" he asked. He didn't sound angry, but rather amused and Leo swore he saw signs of a smile in the corner of his mouth.

"I...er..oh,well...I was just wondering," Leo answered and looked away as quick as he could. He felt caught. Max had a way to always notice what he was thinking. It was intimidating sometimes and he didn't want to be that obvious. Maybe he could ask him another time again. If he was lucky, Max didn't ask anymore. Then, he heard footsteps approaching him and the very next moment Max was sitting on the armrest next to him.

"It was a whole lot different...," he said. Leo looked up and saw Max smiling at him with soft eyes.

"Was it?" Leo asked and felt his face blushing again, causing yet another smile on Max's face.

"Sorry," he said quickly. Why the hell did he feel so embarrassed all of a sudden? "I shouldn't have asked it..."

Max shook his head, stroking a few of Leo's strands out of his face.

"No need to feel sorry," he said. "I know you wanted to know for a while."

There it was. He knew. Leo felt confirmed in his theory of Max reading his mind more than ever.

"I left home when I was around seventeen," Max said.

"Why?"

"I had no choice. My family didn't want me there anymore...," he said and hesitated for a moment, staring into space.

Leo waited a moment, then carefully asked: "Did you do anything?"

Max nodded. "Oh yes... I'm afraid what I did was the most horrible thing my family could imagine...I fell in love..."

Leo stared at him with wide eyes. He didn't expect that much of an honest answer, thinking about it. Especially not from Max.

"You need to know ,"Max continued, avoiding his eyes. "My family was very conservative. They wanted me to marry. Some girl they decided to be the right one for me. I had only seen her once and didn't think to object at this time. But then...I met Carol... She had everything. She was breathtakingly gorgeous and intelligent and everything. When I noticed what she meant to me, I couldn't possibly do as my parents expected from me. And of course, they disapproved of her. As if anything else was possible."

Leo wondered whether that anger in Max's voice was intentional or if he only imagined it.

"Anyway, they left me this one choice... Either do as they told me or leave...," Max said.

"So, you left?!" Leo concluded.

"Yeah, I left... But that was a long time ago," Max was turning and looked at him again, beginning to smile slightly once more. "It was stupid of me after all... We lived in a small apartment...not more than a broom cupboard to be exact... in the Bronx." He tried to sound casually, but Leo knew was putting on a show.

"How come you never spoke of her before?" he asked.

"It's not that easy," Max answered. "We didn't have any comfort back then. It didn't matter. We owned the world back then, just having each other. But then... she got sick. And it was impossible to pay for anything, let alone asking my family for money. They wouldn't have had it anyway. So, I couldn't help her in any way...I prayed... watched the stars up above every night, wishing for her to get recover...But... "

Leo gasped. "Did she die?"

Max shook his head, looking down. His eyes looked sad and Leo almost felt bad for letting him remember something that obviously must hurt him a lot.

"She...well... One day I was coming home and she wasn't there anymore...," he said.

"She left you?"

"Sort of... When I was running down the stairs of the hallway and entered the backyard... well... She always adored the little garden behind the house... I just never thought she wanted to stay there forever..."

Leo's eyes grew wider and he felt his face getting pale. He clutched his hands onto his mouth.

"She... killed herself?" he whispered.

Max's eyes met his. "She hung herself... on the branches of a tree..."

Leo felt his heart skip a beat. How horrible... He never knew. If he'd known he'd never asked Max about his past. Max on the other hand seemed to notice Leo's thoughts immediately and shook his head again.

"It's okay... She didn't get along too well. She only had me...and hated that life. After getting sick, she always said she couldn't bear it... The city and life in general just poisoned her... But I was broken back then... I didn't know how to go on. And I swore to myself this would never happen again. Not to me or to anyone..."

"You blamed yourself?"

"When...when you witness something like that... It's as though you are responsible. She'd left a letter... It said I kept her in that life and even though she loved me, she knew she had no other way than escaping all of it...," Max didn't take his eyes off Leo, who was initially shocked.

"She was sick," Max replied to the younger man's unbelieving eyes. "She didn't know what she was doing... I know that now."

He turned to look down to the ground again and Leo felt his heart break, seeing the sadness in his partner.

"It was then, I never wanted to get to close to anyone ever again. I moved... I did a lot of jobs. I lied and cheated my way through life, always careful not to let anyone take a step too far on me. No more hopes. No more wishing on stars. Until I met Boris. He told me he worked in the theater business. And somehow he seemed to see it as his duty to take care for me... I guess he was quite attached to me somehow... After all, I was young and didn't care for anything... So, I went to become his protege... And for once in my life I had someone as close to a father as I could get... until he died... And I figured, everyone I let into my life...Everyone I ever cared about... disappears somehow. So, I worked alone from that day on... not caring about friendships or even relationships. It was all about getting all the money and all the riches one was able to get in his life. What did I need a partner for? Why would I need a woman? Sleeping around was fine... I was able to get everything I wanted... So why bind to someone? There was no need to..."

Leo looked away and inhaled deeply. So, this was why Max always appeared that grumpy... He'd had the same problems letting someone in as he did...just his story was responsible for it and it wasn't exactly pretty. Leo never imagined anything like that. He felt so sorry having asked; bugging him to tell. All he wanted to achieve is getting to know that man a little better. Now he wished he hadn't reopened old sores...

"And then, when..."he heard Max's voice again. It sounded surprisingly calm, so Leo turned to look at him again. "...when this run of good luck, if you want to call it so, ended... I had no choice than to live here as well. I could only afford one place to stay... so it had to be this here..." He looked around too.

Leo nodded slowly. "Almost like your past getting back to you..."

Max nodded, looking at Leo again. To his surprise a slight smile subtly appeared on his face once more.

"I was desperate... I felt my life crashing down on me and everything I locked away in the back of my memory somewhere was there again. I couldn't stand it. It was like choking... And as hard as I tried it got only worse. I also...thought about ending it, really..," Max said, never leaving Leo's eyes. "And then... you came along... and everything changed."

He ruffled through Leo's brown hair. The former accountant had to grin.

"I'm sorry Max," he said shyly. "If I'd known I wouldn't have asked..."

"You wouldn't have needed to ask then," Max smiled. "But now you know... It wasn't pretty... Jeez, I didn't think about all this in many many years."

Leo flung his arms around his partner in a bear hug.

"Thank you for telling me," he whispered. A great wave of affection came upon him all of a sudden. This man... the one he had admired him his whole life long... had as much a dark past as himself. They weren't all that different. And then, Leo felt more grateful than ever before to be part of his life.

Max replied to him by simply stroking his back softly. He lifted Leo's head carefully by his chin until he felt his lips on his own.

"Hey,... if not you, who then?"


End file.
